The Change Within

㉘Is That The Only Reason?

“Yes, that little prick. He’ll disturb the whole class again all the damn time.”

“Johan?” Jimin muttered, trying to figure out where he had heard that name before.

“Are you—Are you sure?” Yoongi asked with an uneasy half laugh.

“Yeah, he’s still in our group chat, and he spammed us this morning with a load of texts. We still don’t know why he left in the first place. But I think it had something to do with that rumor. Apparently, someone was protecting him and he had sex with him in exchange.”

“Ah, Tae! Isn’t that the guy you had asked me about?” Jimin blurted out as he finally remembered, and all Taehyung could do was stare at him with his mouth wide open, unable to say anything.

“You asked about Johan? Why?” Namjoon threw him a suspicious glance.

“I—I d-don’t—“ Taehyung fell silent as the younger exploded out of his seat and wordlessly charged towards his room.

“Guys, what... what just happened?” Seokjin asked under his breath, taken aback by Jeongguk’s behavior.

“We know Johan. We know him better than anyone, apparently,” Hoseok uttered, bitterness pouring off his words. “He played Jeongguk. And he started the rumor himself.”

“What? How did he play him?” Seokjin asked.

“I liked him.” Jeongguk returned then with his notebook and recipe book and sat at his previous spot. “We said we wouldn’t sleep with others, but he did, and I told him I wanted to end it when I found out. He didn’t like it and spread that rumor, making it seem like he wasn’t the one, like he was the victim. Like I made this deal with him.”

“What...” Seokjin breathed out as he couldn’t believe his ears. “That’s how everyone knows you? And a lot of them...”

“Look askance at me? Yeah, that’s why.” A bitter chuckle came with Jeongguk's remark as he opened his notebook, keeping his eyes on his notes without paying attention to what he was reading.

“I’m sorry, Kook, I didn’t—“ Seokjin started, but he was cut off.

“It’s okay. I’m surprised you guys didn’t know it was me, though.”

“We had heard a bunch of names, so we didn’t really pay attention. You know how these rumors work. Everyone says whatever they want,” said Namjoon.

“Yeah. Anyway, let’s just change the subject.” Jeongguk forced his thoughts out with a shake of his head and focused on his notebook, but a delicate hand rubbing heart-melting patterns on his back raised a tiny smile from him.

He gave a squeeze on Taehyung’s knee, silently thanking him for his sweet gesture, and got lost in his notes and the warm touch on his back that didn’t leave for even a second.

As the others continued chatting about different things, gradually putting aside the heavy moment they went through, Taehyung couldn’t take his eyes off the younger. No matter how much he tried to seem okay, Taehyung knew he wasn’t, but he didn’t know what to do to cheer him up.

So he let him pore over his notebook, which he held so close to him as if he didn’t want anyone to see what was written in it, and vaguely participated in whatever the others were rambling about.

But as time went by, no words came out of Jeongguk’s mouth, something that drove him into a rather sulky mood as he couldn’t stand this any longer. Not knowing what else to do, he yanked the notebook out of his hold and hid it behind his back. “Interact with us.”